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<br /> Pete Hoffinann, Chairman <br /> and Members of the County Council <br /> Page 5 <br /> All of these have different trip generation rates given by the Trip Generation <br /> Handbook. To handle this, the bill would permit some averaging. <br /> The TIAR would have to cover traffic impacts to the affected collector and <br /> arterial roads, in addition to the intersections. This is important to specify, <br /> because in practice, many TIAR's only study intersections. For example, for a <br /> commercial rezoning on Hina Lani Street the TIAR should study the project <br /> intersection with Hina Lani, the Hina Lani intersections with Queen Kaahumanu <br /> and Mamalahoa, and the overall flow of traffic on Queen Kaahumanu and <br /> Mamalahoa in the vicinity of the Hina Lani intersection. The TIAR would have <br /> to estimate increases in traffic for at least five years. <br /> The director's bill then follows Bill 318 in identifying a level of service of <br /> "E" or "F" as triggering additional scrutiny and mitigation requirements. There <br /> are nationally-recognized guidelines for determining level of service for <br /> intersections and for highways. "E" is considered "undesirable" and "F" is <br /> considered "unacceptable" in these guidelines. "F" is anear-gridlock situation, <br /> where, on a highway, there is continual stop-and-go. In lieu of requiring a TIAR <br /> for regional roads, the director can also simply determine that the roads are at "E" <br /> or worse based on available studies. For example, portions of Queen Kaahumanu, <br /> Palani, and Mamalahoa are already at "E"based on recent traffic studies. <br /> Traffic problems and their mitigation can be divided into two types: the <br /> local and the regional. Local problems are those that are in the immediate vicinity <br /> of the proposed project, and maybe solved by improvements in the vicinity. <br /> Examples would include turn lanes in and out of a project. Generally, a project <br /> should be required to pay for its own local mitigation. These kinds of <br /> improvements might be required for safety and convenience even if not strictly <br /> required by the congestion at a particular site. <br /> Regional traffic problems are those that are on the arterial and collector <br /> roads that ultimately carry traffic to and from the project, like Mamalahoa and <br /> Queen Kaahumanu in the example given above. In most cases, congestion on <br /> these roads results from many factors and any one project will have only a limited <br /> effect. The idea behind the director's modification of Bill 318 is that when a new <br /> rezoning is considered for an area where the arterial and collector roads are <br /> already above capacity, or will be in the near future, and it may add significant <br /> new traffic to the roads, that the occupancy of the area to be rezoned should wait <br /> for improvements that mitigate this problem. These improvements can be public <br /> improvements, such as the Queen Kaahumanu Highway widening, or private <br /> improvements, such as those required with the Palamanui rezoning. <br /> In order for this policy not to have the adverse effects on the county's <br /> overall growth policy and the desire to have workforce and other affordable <br /> housing near urban centers (which are also often the areas of the worst traffic <br /> <br />